The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher

 So it's no secret that T. Kingfisher is actually the adult pen name for Ursula Vernon, and I have been following her work for pretty much my entire adult life. Way back in the days before the Biting Pear of Salamanca went viral, Ursula Vernon was primarily an artist who wrote absolutely fascinating little blurbs and sometimes whole chunks of story to go along with her digital paintings. I was always hooked by the glimpses inside the brain of another artist, and the worlds she could evoke in just a paragraph or two.

In the past decades she's achieved success in publishing both kid's books and brilliantly funny reimagining's of fairytales with deeply relatable heroines. I own a number of her books, and intend to collect more of them as I can.

This is the first horror book of hers I've ever heard of.

I'm not a big fan of horror, overall, but on the other hand there is not a single thing she's ever written that I didn't like, so of course when I saw it on the shelf at work I grabbed it. I don't know what I expected, but this book, this story, is like nothing else I have ever encountered in my life. 

When I hear people say a horror book gave them nightmares, I don't imagine this is what they're talking about, but it absolutely did. In fact the book itself feels like a nightmare- which is to say this is not a slasher, not a violent, Hollywood-worthy gorefest or a thriller. This is like those dreams you have where you're not even quite sure if it's a nightmare or not. You can't work out what this place is you're in, because it is vague and unsettling and fills you with a sense of dread but- there's no actual danger that you can see. There's no monsters in sight. There is, in fact, nothing terrible happening to you at all and yet, 

and yet-

you just know that moment when you absolutely do not DARE turn around. And maybe as long as you can't see it, you're safe. 

Or maybe not.

What I'm saying is this book absolutely creeped me out, and also I am not sorry to have read it at all. It was brilliant, and terrifying, and scary on a level that requires true writing skill to achieve. Yeah, I realize that doesn't tell you much at all about the plot but honestly I sort of feel like even trying to describe that would undermine the experience. Of course, as with all her works the heroine is a believably real character with all the messy thoughts and sarcasm and humanity that comes with that. 

If you want to be creeped out, this is an excellent read.